Diane Noury, auteure-compositeure-interprète, fait partie du comité de citoyens de Nicolet-Yamaska et Bécancour qui demandent un débat public au Québec sur la question de l'énergie, l'amendement de la loi des mines, des mesures pour atteindre les objectifs de Kyoto, et le développement des énergies propres. Voir leur manifestation du nov 2010 et leur lettre au Ministre des Mines au sujet du gaz des schistes, et la mobilisation Vigilance Ènergie dont ils font partie. Face à un gouvernement laxiste dirigé par les intérêts fossiles pétro-nucléo-gazières, le mouvement populaire s'est élargi avec le congrès Cochabamba+1 tenu à Montréal la semaine dernière, là où Diane a redigé ce poème... bientôt une chanson? Elle fait également partie du Moratoire d'une génération et d'En vert et pour tous.
village de St-Grégoire
Sommes-nous les seuls êtres humains qui se retournent vers leur passé ? Sommes-nous les seuls à penser qu’ils seront peut-être les derniers ? Sommes-nous tellement intelligents que nous seuls voyons les choses aller ? Sommes-nous tout seuls à aimer la terre comme une mère ?
parc de la rivière Gentilly
Je sais que non, j’espère que non. Je cherche l’autre du dehors, celui et celle de l’autre bord. Je tends la main, je l’ouvre pour donner, pour recevoir, pour échanger. Pour être tendre avec la vie qui me porte. J’aime l’humain, j’honore le vivant.
Et je me lève en ce jour pour marcher droit, le regard fier Jusqu’à l’horizon d’un jour nouveau que nous allons refaire
Ensemble Unis Divers
Forts de nos différences et du meilleur de soi.*
centre nucléaire Gentilly-2 (réfection contestée)
Je veux me battre contre mes propres peurs et mes inhibitions
Et bâtir le pays sacré qui nous habite tous. Je veux rejoindre le bien et le beau en tout. Le voir renaître, grandir, mûrir et rebâtir le monde.
Reprinted from Living on Earth April 14, 2011: Listen to the program. On March 25, Bruce Gellerman of the Public Radio International program Living on Earth spoke with the co-founder of Rocky Mountain Institute about the true costs of nuclear power. “Nuclear is such a slow and costly climate solution, it actually reduces and retards climate protection" -- Lovins
LOE: There are “dangerously high” radiation levels in water leaking from Reactor number 3 at Japan’s Fukushima plant. At our deadline, operators still struggling to gain control of the facility, fear the core might be breached. Prime minister Kan calls the situation “grave and unpredictable” and officials are urging those within 19 miles of the nuclear plant to leave voluntarily, and avoid eating many kinds of green vegetables.To say the least, the nuclear disaster in Japan has refocused attention on the future of the atom as a source of energy. But the threat of global climate change has led even some die hard environmentalists to reconsider and embrace nuclear power. But not Amory Lovins. He’s chairman and chief scientist of Rocky Mountain Institute in Snowmass, Colorado. Amory Lovins, welcome to Living on Earth!
LOVINS: Thank you.
LOE: So is it possible that we can meet our carbon reduction targets without nuclear power?
LOVINS: Of course! Not only that, but we could do so more effectively and more cheaply. It is quite true that if a nuclear plant displaces a coal plant that would replace carbon emissions. But if you spent the same money on efficiency, renewables and combined heat and power, you would reduce the carbon emissions by about two to ten times more and about 20 to 40 times faster. So nuclear is such a slow and costly climate solution, it actually reduces and retards climate protection, compared with a best buys first approach.
LOE: When you say it’s slow, isn’t it people like you that are holding up the process with lawsuits, holding up the process of licensing nuclear power plants?
LOVINS: Not in the least! I know the industry likes to blame environmental groups — of which, by the way, we are not one — for holding up licensing for several decades. New nuclear power plants in this country are offered subsidies that now rival or exceed their total construction costs. And yet, even though that’s been true since 2005, three years before the financial crash, they’ve been unable to raise a penny of private capital, simply because the cost and risks are unfinanceable. Wall Street will not invest in them — it’s an utterly unfinanceable technology, and it’s obvious why — it’s grossly uncompetitive.
LOE: But can renewables, like wind for example, produce enough energy, enough density to replace nuclear power plants, which are huge and hugely powerful. And, plus, the wind doesn’t blow on calm days.
LOVINS: Yeah, well, that’s two separate points. The first one — I’m afraid the industry got it backwards. Actually, if you properly do the math — and count if you count the whole nuclear fuel cycle, not just the power plant, not just the core of the reactor, but the occlusion zone, the uranium mining and so on, it turns out that wind power uses hundreds or thousands of times less land per kilowatt hour, than nuclear does. Even solar photovoltaics are equal to or might be better than nuclear in that respect. As for the wind not blowing and the sun not shining all the time, that’s true. Every kind of power plant can fail. They differ, however, how much fails at once, how often, how long and for what reasons and how predictably. You can predict pretty well when wind or solar will not work, but you cannot predict when a nuclear plant will fail. They break without warning about three to five percent of the time — big coal nuclear plants are down about ten or twelve percent of the time — and for that reason, we’ve designed grids for over a century to cope with that intermittence that every power plant suffers from. So you don’t depend on any single plant, you depend on the whole grid. So it turns out, if you diversify renewables by type so they’re not all affected by weather the same way, you diversify them by location, so they don’t all see the same weather at the same time, and you integrate them with the resources on the grid, both power plants and ways to save or shift electric use, then you can have a largely, or wholly renewable electric supply system at very reasonable cost, with greater reliability and resilience than we have right now.
LOE: I find it a little bit ironic, you know — I see in these pictures from Japan — and if they had put a little bit — if they had put a wind turbine on top of the nuclear complex there, the plant might have had power and would still be running.
LOVINS: Actually, the wind machines in the vicinity were not affected by the earthquake and tsunami, and the utilities have been calling for them to crank out every bit of juice they can to help keep the grid up. Look, here’s a quick summary of what’s going on with nuclear in the world. At the end of 2010, there were 66 nuclear units, officially listed as “under construction” worldwide. You look a little closer, you’ll find a dozen of them have been listed as “under construction” for over 20 years, 45 of them have no official start up date, half of them are late. All 66 of them are in centrally planned power systems, not a single one of them is a free-market purchase. And since 2007, nuclear growth has added less electricity to our supply each year, then even the costliest renewable — solar power — and it will probably never catch up.
LOE: But they’re having rolling blackouts in Japan right now because they don’t have the nuclear power plants online.
LOVINS: Of course if you lose a lot of capacity, you can be short. And they were already a bit short. But I would actually view that as a drawback of nuclear power in two respects. First, to make it cheap, they tried to put a bunch of plants in one place, which was always a bad idea, because if something goes wrong with one plant, you can’t even get in to fix the others and keep them from developing serious problems. Second, nuclear plants are shut down abruptly, when there’s a loss of grid connection, like in the tsunami. And the trouble with that is, it is then very hard to restart the plant. So in 2003, we had a big blackout in the northeastern US, nine plants were running perfectly until the blackout and then they went to zero, and it took two weeks to get them all back up. And so they’re like an anti-peaker, they’re guaranteed unavailable when you most need them. Renewables don’t have that problem.
LOE: Amory Lovins is the chairman and chief scientist of Rocky Mountain Institute in Snowmass, Colorado. Well, Mr. Lovins, thank you so very much.
LOVINS: You’re welcome.
"The exploration and use of outer space....shall be for peaceful purposes and be carried out for the benefit and in the interest of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development... prevention of an arms race in outer space would avert a grave danger for international peace and security." -- UN General Assembly's Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space Resolution A/55/32 of 3 Jan 2001. US militarization of space flouts the UN resolution. Pax Americana (2009) feature doc by Denis Delestrac, premiered on CBC-TC Apr 2010 as Masters of Space, (disponible en français: Pax Americana ou la conquête militaire de l'espace). The cost of these real-life Star Wars: $200 billion and counting. A defense analyst calls missile defence the "longest running fraud" in US history. It is missile offence. One of 'Dubya' Bush's first acts was to scuttle the ABM treaty. Pentagon spokesmen tell us clearly they want military, not moral, high ground. Their aim is world dominance in defense of American corporate interests, possible first strikes -- and feel "sorry for any one who challenges us". USAF weapons experts and military chaplains cheerlead for the "just wars" to come. Charlie Sheen, Noam Chomsky, Helen Caldicott and others (pacifists, scientists, politicos, diplomats) point out that the system is playing with the lives of your grandchildren. See also the update in World Can't Wait, Star Wars analyses by Helen Caldecott. Wikipedia on the 1964 movie Dr Strangelove.
Pre-Congress Meeting to the 19th World Congress of IPPNW, 26 August 2010, Basel Switzerland:
Indigenous People and their representatives attending the Pre-Congress "Sacred Lands, Poisoned Peoples" at this critical time of intensifying destruction to Mother Earth and human health by nuclear resource development have gathered and shared stories of resistance to uranium mining across the globe. From Canada and USA to Niger, Mali, Namibia, Tanzania and Malawi, from Russia, Germany, Australia, Brazil and India, communities facing dramatic impacts from this toxic industry have come together in unity.
Past, present and future generation of Indigenous Peoples are disproportionately impactedby uranium mining, nuclear weapons and the nuclear power industry. The nuclear fuel chain radioactively contaminates our people's health, land, air, and waters and threatens our very existence and our future generations. Uranium mining, nuclear energy development and international agreements that foster the nuclear fuel chain violate our basic human rights and fundamental laws of Mother Earth, endangering our survival and spiritual wellbeing.
The dangerous health impacts of radioactive exposure begin with uranium mining. We reaffirm the Declaration of the World Uranium Hearing in Salzburg, Austria, in 1992 that uranium and its radioactive decay products must remain in the ground. We stand in solidarity with those working for an end to uranium mining and processing, irresponsible radioactive waste management, nuclear power and nuclear weapons.
We dedicate ourselves to a nuclear free future for all peoples.
See also its congress blog and its international youth tour
"Voices like ours are needed now more than ever for peace, for civil rights, for children, for a life on this planet, for our grandchildren. War is stupid. To bring about the changes we need in society, all of us must speak out and act." -- Muriel Duckworth
This video entitled "1945-1998" shows all the nuclear tests between 1945-1998. Each second represents a month. The size of the flash varies with kilotonnage. It starts out slowly, with the Manhattan Project's single test in the US, and the small but terrible A-bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Eventually, 2053 blasts, of which the US detonated 1032.
The 2006 and 2009 tests by North Korea are not shown. Hashimoto says "The blinking light, sound and the numbers on the world map show when, where and how many experiments each country conducted. I created this work [to show]... the extremely grave, but present problem of the world." He has also made Overkilled (2 min) and The Names of Experiments, on similar themes.
*****
The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) was passed in 1996 by the UN but has not yet come into force, due to big-power reluctance to ratify it (especially US, China, India, Pakistan). See this US map by National Cancer Institute (NCI)showing Americans' exposures to radioactive (iodine-131) fallout from nuclear testing from atmospheric nuclear bomb tests carried out at the Nevada Test Site in the 1950s and 1960s. Thereafter tests were done underground. (click on maps for a clearer view)And atomwatch's map of fallout from Chernobyl: More details of each country's bombs and testing. Hashimoto's video shows one startling fact: the fusillade of tests by the big powers after the Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1963 and SALT 1971 and 1979 -- so much for the myth of the "peaceful atom". Their flagrant violation of good faith bodes ill for current climate negotiations.
Illustration: a course developed by the Baha'i International Community for UN-CSD in May 2009. Click on it to view clearly.
We thank the New Edinburgh News, where the article reproduced below originally appeared. Hugh Robertson is a member of the Ottawa Quaker meeting.
***** On July 1st, 2009 the World Wildlife Fund and the international insurance company Allianz declared that Canada stood last among the G8 countries in implementing policies to combat global warming.
By any yardstick, our record is dismal. We have the third highest ecological footprint in the world and our per capita carbon emissions also place us in the top three offending countries. In their annual Greendex report which measures consumption patterns in seventeen countries, National Geographic ranked Canada second last.
Our record and our reputation have strangely not registered in our collective conscience. Do we lack the honesty to face our darker side? Are we opposed to sacrifice because we are so comfortably cocooned against adversity? What has happened to our vaunted “Canadian values”? Have we deluded ourselves by what Jeffrey Simpson of the Globe and Mail recently referred to as “our deadliest sin: an unsinkable moral superiority”?
Why does Canada lack the political will to confront the climate crisis? Why are we the laggards and not the leaders in the international environmental movement? Is it because we cannot muster the maturity that is fundamental to the functioning of a democracy? Is it because we allow our baser instincts, like self-interest, to direct our voting preferences?
We, the voting citizens, are engaged in a dance of deceit with our politicians. Although we demand moral leadership, courage and vision from our elected officials, they know we have split personalities. We tell the pollsters that environmental concerns are a priority but we tenaciously oppose carbon taxes and increased gasoline prices and we resist initiatives to reduce energy waste, such as smart meters. [Harris-Decima poll 30 Nov 09: 62% of Canadians say they want climate action - Ed.]
Party tacticians are astute at reading the tea leaves. They know that it is budget “goodies” that win elections, not tough medicine. If it is primarily opinion polls, not principles, that direct public policy, then we have only ourselves to blame. The lack of political resolve is merely a reflection of the lack of our own moral resolve. We are willing dance partners.
The ecological crisis is a moral crisis. At the core of the crisis are our economic system and our material lifestyles, underpinned by a value system focused on competitive self-interest, excessive consumption, and hyper-individualism.
The argument that humans are innately selfish creatures is fallacious; we are not pre- programmed to be competitive and cut-throat. Early tribal societies only survived against overwhelming odds by co-operating. At heart, we are a caring and compassionate species. It is our altruistic qualities, not the rugged individualism and “rational self-interest” of Ayn Rand’s novels that will enable us to survive the socio-economic turmoil that must surely accompany climate turmoil.
The so-called “selfish gene,” which has evolved through cultural conditioning over many centuries, has bred an obsession with individual rights and freedom of choice. A sense of entitlement has emerged in our society which in turn has spurred a dramatic increase in material consumption. The climate crisis is essentially a problem of over-consumption and because consumption involves both choice and free will, it is, above all, an ethical issue.
We do not need continuous economic growth to maintain our standard of living. If the Canadian standard of living was replicated by all people on earth, we would need another four planets. So, if our standard of living is clearly unsustainable, what is the purpose of “sustained” economic growth that is so environmentally destructive? The mantra of endless economic growth is both ecologically suicidal and spiritually bankrupt.
The “market” has assumed a central role in our economic ideology. Its proponents argue that it is a value-free mechanism that allocates resources efficiently and determines prices and incomes in an equitable manner. The notion that the market operates in a “value vacuum” is a myth – the market is suffused with self-interest. The institution of the market operating in concert with its twin, private property, drives the economic engine which in turn creates problems that have serious environmental side effects.
The market distorts the distribution of wealth and income in society. Since the size of our individual eco-footprints is largely shaped by the level of our income, preserving the environment is essentially a socio-economic issue.
The market has no ethical vision; “vision” is restricted to forecasting speculative opportunities.
The market does not recognize the precautionary principle which focuses on the protection of the rights of unborn generations. It is short term profits and shareholder “value” that are paramount in market transactions.
There are no moral constraints in the functioning of the market that curb the exploitation of resources and preserve them for the future. “Drill, baby, drill” is the clarion call of the oil industry and then pump every last drop.
The stock market itself has become a barometer of ecological destruction and corporate greed rather than a measure of economic and social well-being.
Some banks and investment houses are advising clients how they can benefit from the ecological crisis. Headlines, such as the following: “Global opportunities of investing in climate change” or “Food for thought—opportunities in agriculture” abound in glossy promotional literature for investors. Ethical investments, such as renewable energy for example, do not seem to merit the same banner headlines. Selling short is a questionable investment strategy, but selling the future of the planet short is lunacy.
Even the media are complicit in hawking opportunities to cash in on global catastrophes with headlines, such as “Canada can profit from the world food-price crisis” – while half the world is starving. The following dubious headline appeared in the business section of a national newspaper recently: “Marketing as a philosophy: How to mine the crisis.”
“Mining” misfortune, capitalizing on crises and selling lifestyles that are unsustainable is hardly responsible journalism and ethical advertising. What has happened to the much hyped initiative, “corporate social responsibility,” promoted by business? How responsible is it for some businesses to fight efforts aimed at climate mitigation only to climb aboard the gravy train of climate adaptation by publicizing potential investment opportunities? Is this what is called moral relativism?
It is distressing to note that the Global Climate Coalition, made up largely of the oil, coal and automobile industries, has led an aggressive public relations campaign countering the scientific claim that fossil fuels are a major cause of global warming. Now the American Petroleum Institute is organizing public rallies to oppose President Obama’s climate and energy reforms. In a move reminiscent of the “Scopes Monkey Trial” of the 1920’s, the US Chamber of Commerce is even attempting to put climate science on trial.
Further, Paul Krugman, Nobel laureate in Economics, was moved to write recently in the N.Y. Times that the Congressional representatives who voted against the climate change bill were climate deniers, guilty of both “treason against the planet” and the betrayal of future generations. Sadly, the same accusation of intergenerational treachery is also true of many of our captains of industry.
A newcomer to the ecological scene is carbon offsets. But are they not just another ethical cop-out? We cannot neutralize our extravagant lifestyles by purchasing forgiveness. Offsets are merely a modern equivalent of the mediaeval practice of papal indulgences. Buying offsets may comfort our consciences but they will not fast track us to heaven. A lower eco-footprint offers far better odds for that final journey.
There are few practical economic or technological solutions to the climate crisis. There is only our determination to live lightly with less and to live in harmony with nature. Market panaceas, such as cap and trade credits, and price increases through carbon taxes will not curb our appetites. It is in our hearts where the solution to a sustainable planet lies, not in our bank balances. Our political culture and economic ideology is firmly focused on short term gain: the long term pain will be our legacy to future generations. Can we not restrain our self-indulgence so that a destabilized climate system and a polluted planet will not imperil both domestic societies as well as international security in the future?
Democracy has never been tested in times of resource scarcity and climate chaos. The Great Depression was a financial crisis precipitated and manipulated by financial interests. Environmental collapse, however, will trigger a breakdown in both our political and economic institutions which in turn will destroy the social fabric, leading to widespread civil strife and dictatorial regimes.
In Climate Wars, Gwynne Dyer describes the possibility of states waging war over water and food shortages. International borders are already being disputed as glaciers melt and Arctic ice disappears. Famines will send uncontrollable waves of climate refugees surging across national borders. And once international security breaks down, there will no longer be the good will and the co-operation essential to stall further ecological deterioration.
Have we not a moral responsibility to ensure that we strengthen the bonds that bind us together as a planetary people and that we ensure the safe and secure transmission of a stable social order into which future generations will be born? From the affluent financier to the landless peasant, we are all shareholders with an equal stake in the natural wealth of the planet. We should remember that we live in a society, not in an economy.
An offshoot – and certainly not a “green shoot” – of an economic system that distributes wealth unevenly is environmental racism. Impoverished communities, usually black, indigenous or Hispanic, are often located near freeways, garbage dumps and oil refineries. The Mikisew Cree of Fort Chipeweyan on Lake Athabasca are experiencing first hand the toxic fallout from the Alberta tar sands with sky rocketing cancer rates. [CBC reports; video interviews with natives, water researcher Dr David Schindler and local medic Dr John O'Connor 13 Oct 07]
The Nuclear Waste Management Organization is seeking a willing community to take spent nuclear fuel for containment in a “deep geological repository.” What a tragedy and an indignity it would be if a struggling First Nations’ reserve was “persuaded” by the lure of money and jobs to accept lethal radioactive waste -- from our wasteful use of electricity -- for burial on their ancestral homelands.
Ecological and social justice for disadvantaged minorities must be an ethical priority in our society. We impoverish ourselves spiritually when we wage war on the weak.
Scientists have clearly established the magnitude of our climate problem, while economists still debate endlessly the costs and benefits of development versus sustainability. But where are the ethicists and the philosophers imploring us to search deep within ourselves for answers to the ecological crisis? At some level -- emotional, intuitive, or intellectual -- we must realize that our lifestyles are out of balance with nature.
We are a sentient species. We have memory and vision, conscience and cognition, imagination and awareness, and yet we are still mired in material addiction and denial. Despite our unique traits, we are inexplicably afflicted with both ethical amnesia and moral myopia. How could we, for example, fish the Atlantic cod to near extinction and now drive the Pacific salmon to a similar fate? [See biologist Alexandra Morton's letter to the Fisheries Minister 8 Sep 09 - Ed.]
Each generation holds the planet in trust for succeeding generations. We act as the custodians of their birthright and the real test of our humanity and, indeed, our spirituality is the state of the world that we bequeath to our offspring.
“Spirituality” is derived from the Latin words “inspirire” meaning “to breathe” and “spiritus” denoting “breath.” The air we all breathe is our shared inheritance; it is essential to life on earth. Given the origin of the word “spirituality,” we must lend it new meaning by recognizing our indivisible union with the natural world and with the air that we, and future generations, breathe in common. If the purpose of life is, ultimately, the perpetuation of life, then preservation of the planet must surely rank as the highest form of spirituality. ***** For introductions to climate ethics, see Wikipedia, Climate ethics.org, Resurgence and Orion magazines, the World Council of Churches ecojustice programme, Yale FORE statements from world religions, Scientific AmericanJune 2008, a multifaith resource list at kecojustice.ning.com; videos and blog of the Baha'i climate ethics workshop for CSD-17 (cover shown above).
The Obama-China deal announced 16 Nov 09 gives new life to the Copenhagen process. China is also a lever to move the recalcitrant Senate and G20. Andrew Revkin of the NYTimes gives us the US-China statement and details of its joint plan.
Reading between the lines, we see: 1. The Copenhagen treaty must be "comprehensive" and "immediate" -- this means setting by 19 Dec 09 binding emissions targets for major polluting countries (Annex 1 and BRIC), and promising adequate mitigation funding to poor countries. There is bound to be a lot of slipping and sliding. I will update my summary frequently.
2. Obama's Plan A is ACES legislation, but if blocked by red&bluedog Senators + lobbyists, his Plan B is unilateral Clean Air enforcement by EPA under the SCUS Massachusetts ruling. His deal with China removes one of the favourite Senate excuses, that a China without emissions controls would suck energy intensive industries out of USA. Anyway, the excuse is obsolete: GM and General Electric (and doubtless others) just announced expansion plans there that dwarf their current US operations. Corporate decisions have already been made. Corporate feet have moved, no matter what lips say.
3. There will be subsidies and boondoggles to make US fossil and nuke lobbyists* drool; their "China market" is estimated to grow to $1 trillion a year:
$150 million/5 yr for a bilateral US-China Clean Energy Research Center, including CCS and syngas by Peabody, GE, AES
Electric Vehicles Initiative: joint fuel emission standards, demos in 12 Chinese cities, electric vehicle production & export (probably joint projects with US automakers). Revkin sayspowering EVs with dirty-fuel electicity is the great danger.
new nuclear generators: the gold rush is on with Bechtel, Areva, GE, Hitachi and others (see my list of participants)
Energy Efficiency Action Plan: joint green-building codes, tests and inspector training, joint Forum yearly [=exports]. For details see CSEP. A comment on Revkin's report blames inaction within USA on mortgage lender rules not building codes.
joint Renewable Energy Plan: tech transfer to states and regions, smart grids, joint Forum yearly [=exports]
*Here's an incomplete list of major US players in the above: Bechtel, Goldman Sachs, General Motors, General Electric, Duke Energy, Peabody Coal, American Electric, AES, Aqua International, VantagePoint Venture Partners, Lexecon, Bradbrook, Applied Materials, First Solar, CISCO, Westinghouse, Weyerhauser, American Wind Energy Association, ACORE, Gore's Repower America, Pew Center Climate Tech (and its Feb 2009 Roadmap report by Pew with Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations, Brookings Institution, Council on Foreign Relations, National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, and Environmental Defense Fund), NRDC, ACCORD, China-U.S. Energy Efficiency Alliance, and Duke U's Nicholas Institute.
4. huge renewables subsidies (labelled "mitigation") from US cap-and-trade will flow apparently to poor countries, but flow right back (via patents, tech transfer, project management, etc) to US-China manufacturers who hope to dominate world market share**, squeezing out Europe which so far leads the field in renewables. This also marks a strategic move away from oil dependency, so the Chinese Peoples' Army, CIA and Pentagon will be onboard. ** cf. Anna Fahey in Grist 17 Jul 09; GE on export strategy 22 Oct 09.
5. a fight for control of $trillions in world "green" financing among Wall St (via bilateral agreements), World Bank carbon funds, over-the-counter offsets, EU-ETS, or a reformed GEF to replace CDM. My guess is that they will cross the finish line in that order. Very bad news. Worse news: part of the pie will be REDD with little MRV -- for example the "conservationist" offsets promoted by CELB in its CCBA Climate, Community and Biodiversity Alliance.
6. GHG emissions by China are now the world's highest, exceeding US. Also, China's and India's rate of GHG increase is the most rapid in the world, says the latest scientific study by Corinne Le Quéré et al. (see her 17 Nov 09 abstract, and a more readable resume by Bristol U). In a personal interview Le Quéré says 6 degree warming is now possible, because sinks are failing, emissions rising ever faster, tipping points come sooner. This Business As Usual (BAU) path will lead to a "die-off" of 6-8 billion people, 85% of humanity (says James Lovelock, Revenge of Gaia, p.141).
Click on this graph for more visible text and full-screen display
Environmental groups will be happy with the "renewables" in the US-China deal, but not with the (oxymoronic) "clean coal" and nukes, and cap-and-trade boondoggles. NGO watchdogs must bark loudly at the worst of these. If ecojustice groups want to have any influence at all they will have to understand the details, where the devil is, and be willing to sup with the "better" corporate interests, using a long spoon. Are they willing and able to make the effort?
Brand ha construido su caso para replantear los objetivos ambientales y métodos tomando en cuenta dos grandes cambios ocurriendo en el mundo. La mayoría de las personas aún no tienen en cuenta que el uso de energia esta cambiando al mundo en desarrollo, donde viven 5 de cada 6 personas.
La mayor parte de la humanidad esta saliendo de la pobreza iendo a las ciudades creando sus propios puestos de trabajo y comunidades (barrios marginales, por ahora). Señaló que la historia del mundo siempre ha sido impulsado por las ciudades más grandes, y estos años son lugares como Mumbai, Lagos, Dhaka, São Paulo, Karachi, y la Ciudad de México, que están creciendo 3 veces más rápido y son 9 veces más grandes que las ciudades en Europa o EEUU. La gente en esas ciudades están subiendo en la escalera de la energía a la red de alta calidad de la electricidad. Tambien estan mejorando los alimentos hacia una mejor dieta, incluiendo mas carne.
Tan pronto como puede, todos en el Sur del globo van a poner el aire acondicionado. El segundo hecho global dominante es el cambio climático. Brand enfatizo que el clima no es un sistema lineal. Tiene puntos inflexibles de las cuales no podemos pasar sin consequencias graves. Tambien hay retroalimentación positiva imprevistos como la rápida descongelacion del hielo del Ártico. El calentamiento global hace mas sequías, lo que reduce la capacidad del globo cargar tantos seres humanos. Habra competencia violenta por los recursos disminuidos, como en Darfur. También se está derritiendo los glaciares de las montanas en Himalaya, que alimentan los ríos por los cuales el 40% de la humanidad depende por agua en epocas sin lluvias --- el Indo, el Ganges, el Brahmaputra, el Mekong, Irrawaddy, el Yangtzé y Amarillo.
El calentamiento global tiene que ser frenado por la reducción de la emisión de las gases que funcionan como invernadero procedentes de la combustión, pero las ciudades requieren báses de la electricidad seguros. Hasta ahora la única energia renovable disponible 24 horas al dia viene de presas hidroeléctricas y la energía nuclear. Brand contraste nuclear con la quema de carbón mediante la comparación de lo que sucede con sus residuos. El residuo de combustion nuclear es pequeña en cantidad, y se puede contener y saber exactamente donde está. En contraste, petroleo y carbon que se quema pone gigatoneladas de dióxido de carbono en la atmósfera, donde permanece durante siglos en una forma que crea nada más que problemas. Brand declaró que el secuestro geológico de los residuos nucleares ha sido probada de ser práctica y segura por los diez años de experiencia en la WIPP en Nuevo México. Tambien estan experimentando con una serie de disenos de microreactores que ofrecen un camino limpio para los países en desarrollo.
Pasando a los cultivos de alimentos genéticamente modificados, Brand señaló que son un éxito enorme en la agricultura, con beneficios al medio ambiente, tales como la labranza de conservación, el uso reducido de plaguicidas, y más de la tierra liberado para ser salvaje. El mundo en desarrollo está a la cabeza con la tecnología, especialmente en el diseño para problemas en los cultivos de la agricultura tropical. Mientras tanto, el nuevo campo de la biología sintética está llevando a una generación de personas manipulando materia genetica por rezones malos.
Sobre el tema de la intervención directa en la bioingeniería climático, Brand sugiere que tendremos que seguir el ejemplo de el beneficio de ingenieros del ecosistema, tales como las lombrices de tierra y de castors. Tenemos que ajustar nuestro nicho (el planeta) hacia una clima continua favorable a la vida, utilizando métodos como nubes brillantes, de agua de mar atomizada, de recrear lo que los volcanes hacen cuando la bomba de dióxido de azufre en la estratosfera enfria todo el mundo. La aversión a las tecnologías verdes, como la nuclear y de ingeniería genética, ha resultado de una idea equivocada de que son de alguna manera antinatural. Lo que llamamos natural y los seres humanos somos inseparables. Vivimos una vida todos juntos. Echa un vistazo a las recomendaciones de Stuart Brand para los libros y sitios web en: Whole Earth Catalog, sbnotes.com, y longnow.org (en inglés).
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Globalizing Green by Stewart Brand
There are two major changes going on in the world. The one that most people still don't take into consideration is that power is shifting to the developing world, where 5 out of 6 people live, where the bulk of humanity is getting out of poverty by moving to cities and creating their own jobs and communities (slums, for now). He noted that history has always been driven by the world's largest cities, and these years they are places like Mumbai, Lagos, Dacca, São Paulo, Karachi, and Mexico City, which are growing 3 times faster and 9 times bigger than cities in the currently developed world ever did.
he people in those cities are unstoppably moving up the "energy ladder" to high quality grid electricity and up the "food ladder" toward better nutrition, including meat. As soon as they can afford it, everyone in the global South is going to get air conditioning.
The second dominant global fact is climate change. Climate is a severely nonlinear system packed with tipping points and positive feedbacks such as the unpredicted rapid melting of Arctic ice. Warming causes droughts, which lowers carrying capacity for humans, and they will fight over the diminishing resources, as in Darfur. It also is melting the glaciers of the Himalayan plateau, which feed the rivers on which 40% of humanity depends for water in the dry season---the Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Mekong, Irrawaddy, Yangtze, and Yellow.
Global warming has to be slowed by reducing the emission of greenhouse gases from combustion, but cities require dependable baseload electricity, and so far the only carbon-free sources are hydroelectric dams and nuclear power. Brand contrasted nuclear with coal-burning by comparing what happens with their waste products. Nuclear spent fuel is tiny in quantity, and you know exactly where it is, whereas the gigatons of carbon dioxide from coal burning goes into the atmosphere, where it stays for centuries making nothing but trouble. Brand declared that geological sequestering of nuclear waste has been proven practical and safe by the ten years of experience at the WIPP in New Mexico, and he paraded a series of new "microreactor" designs that offer a clean path for distributed micropower, especially in developing countries.
Moving to genetically engineered food crops, Brand says that they are a tremendous success story in agriculture, with green benefits such as no-till farming, lowered pesticide use, and more land freed up to be wild. The developing world is taking the lead with the technology, designing crops to deal with the specialized problems of tropical agriculture. Meanwhile the new field of synthetic biology is bringing a generation of Green biotech hackers into existence.
On the subject of bioengineering (direct intervention in climate), Brand suggested that we will have to follow the example of beneficial "ecosystem engineers" such as earthworms and beavers and tweak our niche (the planet) toward a continuing life-friendly climate, using methods such a cloud-brightening with atomized seawater and recreating what volcanoes do when they pump sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere, cooling the whole world. Green aversion to technologies such as nuclear and genetic engineering resulted from a mistaken notion that they are somehow "unnatural." "What we call natural and what we call human are inseparable," Brand concluded. "We live one life".
*****
See Stewart Brand's websites: www.sbnotes.com ("The Annotated Whole Earth") and longnow.com. Thanks to Rolene Walker of walkwithearth.org for this report and the translation into Spanish. Readers of our previous posts here will realize that we disagree with Brand on a number of points. However, as a pioneer of environmentalism and founder of the Whole Earth Catalog and the WELL online forum, he is an influential thinker. In our previous survey of environmental networks, we would place him with "green capitalists".
Stanford civil and environmental engineering professor Mark Jacobson proves that the options touted by coal and ethanol lobbies and the media, are 25 to 1,000 times more polluting than the best renewables. Full text of his paper in Energy and Environmental Science; video interview, PDF of his slideshow. Photo: Stanford News Sources of electric power, best choices to worst:
wind power
concentrated solar power (CSP)
geothermal power
tidal power
solar photovoltaics (PV)
wave power
hydroelectric power
equally bad: nuclear power, and coal with carbon capture and sequestration (CCS)
For transport vehicles, the same results are followed by ethanol as the worst choices:
9. corn-E85 10. cellulosic-E85
Jacobson's is the first quantitative, scientific comparison of US energy sources to compare their impacts on global warming, human health, energy security, water supply, space requirements, wildlife, water pollution, reliability and sustainability. It received no funding from any interest group, company or government agency.
When energy options for all of these impacts are considered, wind is by far the most promising, with over 99% reduction in carbon and air pollution; it would need less than 3 square kilometers of land for the turbines to run the entire U.S. fleet (if BEV: battery-electric vehicles); saving thousands from premature air-pollution-related deaths; and virtually no water consumption. Land between turbines on wind farms would be simultaneously available as farmland or pasture or could be left as open space. A BEV fleet would require 73,000 to 144,000 5-megawatt wind turbines, fewer than the 300,000 airplanes the U.S. produced during World War II and far easier to build. By contrast, corn ethanol will continue to cause more than 15,000 air pollution-related deaths in the country every year, and take 15% of agricultural land. Cellulosic ethanol is even worse than corn ethanol because it results in more air pollution, requires more land to produce and causes more damage to wildlife.
Current US energy subsidies throw money away on the wrong options, he says. “Biofuels are the most damaging choice we could make. Recent research shows they not only produce more CO2 ... [but] actually cause more harm to human health, wildlife, water supply and land use than current fossil fuels."
So-called "clean coal" is not clean at all, he says. "Coal with CCS emits 60 to 110 times more carbon and air pollution than wind energy.” It has no effect on pollution due to mining or transport of the coal, and requires about 25 percent more coal, increasing mountaintop removal, water and air pollution. Coal and nuclear energy plants take much longer to plan, permit and construct; adding years of emissions from outmoded "dirty" plants while waiting for the new energy sources to come online.
Nuclear emits about 25 times more carbon and air pollution than wind energy. It has other risks. "Once you have a nuclear energy facility, it's straightforward to start refining uranium,” as Iran is doing and Venezuela is planning to do. "The potential for terrorists to obtain a nuclear weapon or for states to develop nuclear weapons that could be used in limited regional wars will certainly increase.” He calculates that deaths from one terrorist nuke in a small city would be double the deaths from current vehicle air pollution over 30 years in the entire USA.
Though some call his highest-ranked renewables variable and therefore unreliable, previous studies by his research group showed that a national energy grid coordinating output from different locations would overcome variability and deliver a steady supply of baseline power to users.
He says, "There is a lot of talk among politicians that we need a massive jobs program to pull the economy out of the current recession. Well, putting people to work building wind turbines, solar plants, geothermal plants, electric vehicles and transmission lines would not only create jobs but would also reduce costs due to health care, crop damage and climate damage from current vehicle and electric power pollution, as well as provide the world with a truly unlimited supply of clean power."
Trident missile launch 2008 courtesy spacewar.comThe military is the only sector of the economy where emissions of green-house gases (GHG) can be reduced by greater than 100%. This is because militarism is the only type of activity whose primary purpose is destruction.
When a road is bombed in Serbia, energy is used to rebuild it. Energy usage translates to the emission of GHG, primarily carbon dioxide (CO2). When a home is leveled in Afghanistan, reconstruction requires energy. Every hospital brought down and every person maimed in Iraq means CO2 emissions during the treatment of patients and construction of new treatment facilities.
Military production is unique. If it were halted, GHG emissions would be reduced by an amount equal to (a) GHG emitted from repairing what the military bombed, plus (b) GHG produced during its regular activities of building bases, using weapons and transporting troops and equipment.
Though the official figure for the military budget is $623 billion, the War Resistors League calculates total military-related spending at $1,118 billion by including NASA, Department of Energy nukes, vet benefits and interest on past military debts. Another $110 billion should be tacked on for extra spending on the war in Iraq.
The gross domestic product (GDP) is $13,246.6 billion. [2] Putting these together leads to an estimate that just under a tenth of the US economy is military-related spending: [$1,188B + $110B] / $13,246.6B = 9.80%
This only accounts for military sales to the Pentagon. Since US arms manufacturers are major providers for regimes throughout the world, military spending actually accounts for considerably more than 10% of the GDP.
Graphic by Harold Willens, updated 1990 by Canadian Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, certified accurate by US Senate staff. The centre dot is all the explosives used in WW2, the surrounding dots the world nuclear arsenal. Those carried on one Poseidon sub are shown in the small circle upper left, in the circle lower left the 24 megatons (8 x WW2) on one Trident sub. Two squares (300 mt) will destroy all large and medium cities in the world.
Militarism may contribute more than any other 10% of the economy to oil depletion, creation of toxins and habitat destruction. Yet, the one area of the economy where a greater than 100% reduction in greenhouse gases is possible is the area least likely to be discussed in connection with climate change.
(Note: other sources for this brief, submitted to the CCAMU Citizens' Inquiry, can be checked by clicking on the tag "nuke" in the blue tagcloud on the bottom right of the blog.) World reactor map courtesy of INSCThe international nuclear lobby (see the list at the end of this post) began its campaign promoting nuclear power as "green" and "safe" in the late 1990s. Its initial success was closely connected to the worldwide pressure in that decade of the Washington Consensus for globalization and deregulation of money markets.
The first attempt was covert. In 1998-2000 the Clinton administration’s attempts to gain financing for construction of nuclear power plants under the Kyoto CDM (Clean Development Mechanism) were denounced as "tricks" by environmentalists.
The opening gun of the overt international campaign was a keynote speech on "the need for nuclear power", by Don Johnson, a former Liberal cabinet minister from Canada now Secretary-General of OECD (which has its own nuclear agency), to a joint conference of the American and European Nuclear Societies in Washington, DC in November 2000. Johnson had also been an eager advocate of globalization, the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, and free trade -- all of which suggests that he was acting as spokesman for the Washington Consensus, not an unusual role for Canadian politicians abroad. An OECD official document declared in 2001 that nuclear power had "unique potential as... sustainable energy". Johnson continued to urge new nuclear construction through 2005, when he gave another speech to the International Nuclear Energy Association, shortly before retiring from OECD.
In 2000, John B. Ritch III, after serving 7 years as US ambassador to IAEA, became director-General of the World Nuclear Association. A longtime adviser to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in 1999 he declared nuclear power was "the only answer to global warming". Playing a central role in the ensuing campaign, by 26 November 2007 he boasted that a "nuclear renaissance" had been achieved by the worldwide lobby. Worldwide, 441 existing nuclear plants are close to the end of their operating life; the IAEA estimates 40 new ones by 2020; the WNA claims 64 will be added; financial speculators talk of 80.
For industry insiders and government officials, the WNA offers yearly symposia, frequent seminars and courses. In 2003, it founded the World Nuclear University, a well-funded body whose supporters include James Lovelock, the World Association of Nuclear Operators, the IAEA, and the Nuclear Energy Association of the OECD. It is highly likely that the WNA and WNU coordinated the international "nuclear green" campaign, providing data and strategy to national lobbyists. For instance, a 2002 Nuclear Renaissance conference in Washington DC included speeches by Richard A. Meserve, chairman of the U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Gail Marcus of DOE, and a Canadian AECL executive.
Part of the worldwide nuclear lobby’s success is its mixed nature, both public and state-owned, which has given it enormous influence in obtaining subsidies. Governments like to throw good money after bad, if only to prove that initial decisions were correct. And few politicians can say a flat “no” to a well-organized lobby with inside support from state bureaucrats as well as outside pressures from private industry.
In 2006, the Nuclear Energy Institute (ex-American Nuclear Energy Council) of Washington, DC, claiming 206 members in 60 countries, hired the PR firm Hill and Knowlton to conduct a million-dollar ad campaign, apparently connected with U.S. Congress' passing of an energy bill that opened the door to nuclear plant construction, with heavy support from the Bush administration. This campaign seems to have paid off handsomely. The current Lieberman-Warner bill offers the industry about $544b in subsidies, with more expected to be added by senatorial amendments.
The NEI formed a front group, the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition aka CASEnergy, led by former EPA chief Christine Whitman and ex-Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore, to disguise links between the campaign and the nuclear lobby.
Key to this campaign was the alliance between US political insiders of both parties, and the front group. One of the minor scandals of the 2008 Democratic primaries was the discovery that Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton's strategist, was actively lobbying for the nuclear company Exelon. It had been a major contributor to Clinton, a lesser one to Obama via "employee contributions". Penn worked for Burson Marsteller, another PR firm notorious for its less-than-ethical lobbying practices. On the Republican side, McCain has promised “a comprehensive nuclear component” in energy policy.
The Bush Jr administration gave heavy support throughout. Its 2000 transition team included as energy advisors: Joseph Colvin of the NEI; Senator J. Bennett Johnston (Dem-LA 1972-97) a former Committee on Energy and Natural Resources member turned lobbyist; Thomas Kuhn, President of Edison Electric Institute and ex-head of the American Nuclear Energy Council; along with four other nuclear utilities. The woman appointed as deputy director of Bush's DOE, Gail H Marcus, was also president of the American Nuclear Society. The political fix was in from day one.
The Labour governments of Tony Blair and Anthony Brown were convinced to announce a major UK nuclear construction program by a campaign whose spearhead was a key insider, their science advisor Sir David King. A High Court judge ruled against their handpicked nuclear inquiry in 2007, ordering a less biased one to be held this year. Similarly, French president Sarkozy became a strong supporter shortly after Areva announced a joint nuclear plant project with China. Like Canada and the USA, both France and the UK faced lobbying from within by state-owned nuclear companies and export development agencies, adding their voices to those of private industry, financiers, and their flacks. In Germany, where the minority government depends on anti-nuke Greens who form part of the ruling coalition, lobbyists have not yet succeeded.
A wave of international mergers and alliances strengthened the industry’s appeal to governments and stock markets. Financial marketeers trumpeted the rebirth of the nuclear industry, claiming that uranium prices had risen 1600% in six years (note: largely due to shortage of high-grade ore). The City and Wall Street became even more interested when the UK passed laws to limit liability of nuclear operators and waste disposal companies, while guaranteeing profit. Similar protections against liability were being created by American and other countries' laws, covertly inserted into regulations, or achieved by company lawyers creating new corporate shells. In effect, the moral risk was now being passed to the state, and to taxpayers, while profits were guaranteed by "perverse subsidies". Security and safety risks, as always, would be borne by the public.
Chernobyl photo by Elena 20 years after the disaster; the sarcophagus is now disintegrating.
It was these risks that weakened the nuclear renaissance campaign. Old nuclear scandals kept cropping up: rediscovery of the 1966 Palamares N-bomb debris in Spain, accidents and radioactive pollution (often deliberate, and long kept as state secrets) -- at Semipalatinsk, Seversk, Mayak, Browns Ferry, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, Sellafield, Dounreay, La Hague, Palo Verde AZ, Yellowknife, Port Colborne, Brunsbuttel, Tokaimura, Hamaoka, Kashiwazaki Kariwa, Sierra Blanca TX, Tricastin -- highlighted links between nuclear weaponry and the so-called “peaceful atom” – as well as alerting the public to continuing risks of nuclear power for which no reliable solution has been found. To refreshed memories of leaks and meltdowns, we must now add nuclear proliferation, smuggling and terrorism. In 2005 an Al Qaeda website published an 80-page manual for making a dirty bomb. The IAEA has reported 650 cases of nuclear smuggling since 1993, with rising incidence: 100 in 2004 and 103 in 2005. Though atomic waste production has reached 10,000 kg per year, there is still no permanent storage anywhere in the world. Safety and security threats, radwaste (particularly from MOX reprocessing), and proliferation remain the unsolved problems of nuclear advocacy.
Finally, though nukes are proclaimed as “carbon neutral”, the lobbyists’ accounting of carbon emissions during mining, processing, operation, decommissioning and radwaste disposal is unworthy of trust. They are paid to underestimate and conceal.
Citizens concerned about nuclear sprawl can learn from the lobbyists’ use of professional public relations. You too must learn how to play the game. Fortunately there are many handbooks available. Three main points:
1. Look out for stories “planted” by PR firms. That is what they are paid for. They develop contacts, know the deadlines for each medium, and provide stories in the style, length and format needed. Lazy reporters (or biased editors) often run these stories virtually unchanged. 2. Answer media stories with your own information, at the appropriate length and format for each medium. Rightwing bloggers deserve one comment referring readers back to an authoritative website, but do not let yourself be drawn into unending debate with closed minds. 3. Organize your answers. Create a looseleaf speakers’ book, share it with others, add to and improve the material. Know its contents well enough that you can give a brief memorable “sound bite” in your own words. Some of the most authoritative sources for in-depth fact-checking are Mother Jones, CSPP, NIRS, CCNR, IPPNW, Union of Concerned Scientists, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Rocky Mountain Institute, Pembina Institute’s Basics on Base Load (2007); watchdogs Corpwatch, Sourcewatch, and PR watch. See also Carbon-Free and Nuclear-Free: A Roadmap for US Energy Policy by Arjun Makhijani and The Nuclear Illusionby Amory Lovins and Imran Sheikh. You should always verify your facts in at least two reliable sources. Greenpeace, FOE, Suzuki, and Pembina have useful lists of nuclear “myths”. Wikipedia should not be relied on exclusively but is a good starting point for basic information – follow its links, and then Google keywords for additional sources. Update your fact-checking at least once a month. You will be astonished at what new facts you discover.
Appendix: an incomplete list of nuclear lobbyists
International corporations, mergers and lobbyists Bechtel BNFL British Nuclear Fuels plc - purchased Westinghouse and ABB/Combustion 2002, operates Sellafield in UK EU chemical industry lobby announced its support for the nuclear lobby EBRD European Bank for Reconstruction and Development Edison Foratom – lobby within EU GE General Electric – merged with Hitachi for $2b NET.EXCEL – international radwaste consortium incl. state and private companies) Donald James Johnson, sec-gen. OECD 1996-2006 Nuclear Energy Institute – lobby, with 206 members in 60 countries OECD Nuclear Energy Association URS San Francisco-based multinational, purchased Washington Group for $3.1b Westinghouse – purchased by British Nuclear Fuels 2002; Toshiba bought Westinghouse from FCNL for $5.4b in 2006 World Energy Council World Nuclear Association (note its membership list), and its World Nuclear University -- Australian PM’s Task Force June 2006 – Liberal government defeated 2007 Chiang Pin-Kung, ex-ch. Council of Economic Planning & Development, Taiwan TVO: Teollisuuden Volma, Finland Vattenfall, Sweden Asea Atom, Sweden Wolfgang Clement, ex-SPD Economic Minister, Germany Atomforum, Germany, linked to Merkel’s CDU Ibec – Irish business lobby Tokyo Electric and many other nuke plant operators, Japan Toshiba - purchased Westinghouse Mitsubishi – allied or merged with GE Minatom and Atomstroyexport, Russia Siemens, Germany CGNPG, China – joint nuke plant construction with Areva, France Jose Alberto Acevedo Monoy, of Mexico Nuclear Power Program under SENER (M of Energy)
Canada AECL Atomic Energy Canada Ltd Cameco – responsible for radon, uranium, arsenic and fluoride pollution at Port Hope (see the recent article in Walrus magazine) CEA Canada Export Development Corporation Canadian Nuclear Association Canadian Nuclear Society - founders Rodney Anderson, Bruno Comby, Jeremy Cutlin. Current pres. Eric Williams, ex-Bruce Power, presidency changes yearly. Council: Dan Manley, Ben Reuben, Kris Mohan, Pierre Girouard, Jad Popovic and Jeremy Whitlock all of or ex-AECL; Jim Harvey of CNSC Canadian Nuclear Safety Assoc.; Ken Smith of UNECAN; Ned Alexander and Bill Schneider of Babcock & Wilcox Canada; Paul Lafreniere of CANDU Owners Group; Prabhu Kundurpi and Andrew Lee, both ex-Ontario Power Generation; Murray Stewart of World Energy Council; Syed Zaidi ex-Énergie NB Power (Point Lepreau); Mohammed Younis of NSS Nuclear Safety Solutions; John Luxat, and Dave Novog of McMaster University; Dorin Nichita of UOIT. Jan Carr, CEO Ontario Power Authority Stephen Harper, Conservative PM – but former Liberal PMs never refused nuclear subsidies Ken Nash, NWMO Nuclear Waste Management Association see also the June 08 Nuclear Renaissance wish-list and its participants
France Areva, CEO Anne Lauvergeon , result of merger of Framatom and Cogema EDF Électricité de France
UK A2A David Attenborough Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, Prime Ministers British Nuclear Group BNFL British Nuclear Fuels plc - purchased Westinghouse and ABB/Combustion 2002, operates Sellafield reprocessing plant, in 1990s falsified safety data for fuel shipped to Japan, privatized 2005 after leaks and radwaste scandals British Energy CEO Bill Coley CBI Confederation of British Industry Chambers of Commerce, England and Scotland Alan Duncan, Tory shadow Business Secretary Edison John Hutter, Business & Industry Secretary Sir David King, science advisor to Blair and Brown James Lovelock, Gaia environmentalist NIREX former waste disposal agency Nuclear Decommissioning Agency – owns British Nuclear Group ? Oxford Research Group – James Kemp and others Royal Association of Engineers Spiked – rightwing bloggers and journalists; also group blog by Rob Johnson, Joe Kaplinsky, James Wondhuysen Zero Carbon – lobby of Cambridge nuclear scientists
USA B&WNT Babcock & Wilcox Nuclear Technologies Bechtel Everett Becker, National Nuclear Security Administration, ex-Lockheed Martin BKSH - PR subsidiary of Burson Marsteller Boeing – operates Susana Field Lab with Rocketdyne/U California; the corporation, which has a longtime link with the nuclear industry, put DU as counterweight in 707 tailplanes 1960s-70s, revealed when a Korean cargo plane crashed in Sussex 1999, with about 1/3 of DU reported lost and unrecoverable at the crash site; also JIMO project under CEO Dr Joe Mills, a nuclear engineer - nuclear spaceships for NASA BWX Technologies – subsidiary of McDermott Engineering, submarine reactors, Pantex nuclear weapons factory jointly run with Sandia Lab, Honeywell, Bechtel, Livermore Stewart Brand, founder of Whole Earth Catalogue and the WELL Burson Marsteller, PR agency CASEnergy: Clean and Safe Energy – front group Constellation Energy Consumers Energy Joseph Colvin of NEI Constellation Energy – 4 plants (restructuring to reduce liability, report by Corpwatch 23 Oct 02) John Deutch, ex-CIA director, wrote The Future of Nuclear Power DOE Department of Energy – funds research, nuke plants and weapon development Dominion Resources – 6 plants (restructuring to reduce liability, report by Corpwatch 23 Oct 02) Duke Energy Edison Electric pres. Thomas Kuhn, ex-head American Nuclear Energy Council (now NEI) Entergy - 10 plants (restructuring to reduce liability, report by Corpwatch 23 Oct 02) EXCEL Services – radwaste (linked to international NET.EXCEL ?) Exelon – 10 plants (restructuring to reduce liability, report by Corpwatch 23 Oct 02) First Energy - responsible for Davis-Besse nuke plant safety failure in Ohio 2002 GE General Electric – merged with Hitachi for $2b Halliburton – its Brown & Root division refuels and refits Trident submarines Hill and Knowlton, PR agency Ex-Sen. J Bennett Johnson - “consultant” Dr Dale Klein, nuclear engineer, chairman US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (and other former NRC leaders) Lyndon Larouche, perennial presidential candidate, started as a Trotskyite, now far rightwing Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory – jointly operated by U California, BWX, Bechtel, Washington Group International Lockheed Martin Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory – U California (until 2006), Bechtel Gail H Marcus, deputy director of DOE, pres. of American Nuclear Society Richard A Meserve, chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Patrick Moore, ex-Greenpeace, leader in CASEnergy, "Greenspirit" consulting for industrial polluters Northrop Grumman-Honeywell-Fluor consortium, which founded radwaste company Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, under CEO Chuck Munns, former Vice-Adm. US submarine force Nuclear Energy Institute (formerly American Nuclear Energy Council) – nuke lobby, see international list NuStart Energy consortium in MS and AL, incl. Westinghouse, GE Potomac Communications Group – PR for NEI and utilities companies PPI Progressive Policy Institute – Bill Clinton’s Democratic think tank, funded by rightwing Bradley Foundation Senators Jim Webb (D-VA) and Lamar Alexander (R-TN) in Roll Call 21 Dec 2009 Shaw - joint venture with Areva to build MOX reprocessing plant in SC TRW Parsons – radwaste consortium University of California – Livermore, Los Alamos, Susana Field nuclear labs Unistar, pres. Mike Wallace - joint venture with Constellation, EDF URS San Francisco-based multinational USAF next-generation stealth bomber to carry nukes (for “theatre war” ?) – report in defensetech.org 19 Dec 07 Washington Group International – engineering, mining, construction, radwaste Westinghouse, CEO Steve Tritch – purchased by British Nuclear Fuels 2002; then by Toshiba in 2006 for $5.4b Christine Whitman - ex-NJ governor and Bush EPA Winston & Strawn – lawyers, Washington
Financial advisors who tout uranium investments James Dines Money Week Gerry White, UK and many others
Sommes-nous les seuls êtres humains qui se retournent vers
Je sais que non, j’espère que non.
Je veux me battre contre mes propres peurs et mes inhibitions
